nuxx.net – Page 107 – Making, baking, and (un-)breaking things in Southeast Michigan.

Customs Declarations

Published May 4, 2009

Filling out customs declarations is a real big hassle. Because of their odd size they must all be hand-written. Additionally, when I dropped all of these international SDrive NUXX orders off at the Post Office, the person working at the counter admonished me for sticking the declarations to the back of the packages. This bothers me because there isn’t enough room to fit them on the front of most small packages, the directions do not indicate that one should apply them to any particular area of the package, and I’ve historically had no problem with them stuck to the back.

Ah well, at least all the international shipments are set. Now I just need to sell a few more so that I break even on the project and everything will be set. Oh, and prep the CAD and artwork files for release…

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Safe Route To Work

Published May 3, 2009

Today I decided to ride to work and back, just to test out the route. There are basically two routes I can take, but one involves riding in rather busy, shoulderless, 45 MPH roads. I took the other route, which I’ll call the “safe” route, which is a mix of sidewalks, paved paths, and rail trails. Also, before anyone gets too upset about my saying sidewalks, know that most of these are as wide as a typical cycling path, and have very few driveways or roads crossing them. They are also generally situated between fences or berms bordering what I call “island-neighborhoods” and major roads. That is, neighborhoods which have a single entrance/exit to the main road and do not connect each other, and thus don’t provide good residential streets for riding through.

The ride there was a bit more difficult than the return, as there was an almost-constant headwind, and it’s mostly uphill the whole way. The route is 15.4 miles one way and has total of ~1144 ft (~349m) of climbing, with much of that being in the last few miles. The route itself is quite nice, with the middle part going through Rochester, MI, under a nifty looking concrete bridge, and through some nicely wooded wetlands. There’s only a few areas which are actually unpleasant to ride, most of which involving crossing larger local roads.

Hopefully I’ll actually ride to work in a week and a half or so, possibly on the 15th of the month. I figure that I’ll bring a change of clothes and food to work the day before, and leave my laptop there. Then I’ll be able to ride both to work and back home with only cycling supplies.

If you’d like to see it, here is a KML of the route from my house to work. Note that it works just fine in Google Earth doesn’t currently work in Maps: 03-May-2009_TestRouteToWorkSafe.kml

Here’s three photos from the ride, too:

· Sitting on a grassy hill outside of one of the buildings I work in, eating some almonds and taking a break before heading home.
· Beneath Rochester Road, looking south, just south of Downtown Rochester, off of the Clinton River Trail, while on the way home from a test ride to work.
· Looking north along the underside of Rochester Road towards the Croskey Lanni building.

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Functional / Safe Rear Wheel

Published May 2, 2009

After getting home from Danielle’s house (and listening to one episode of This American Life each direction) I spent some time finishing off my rear wheel. Once it was dished to my satisfaction, trued, and reassembled I fitted it to my bike and went for a series of test rides. The tire was the Continental TravelContact at 55psi, which is what was on the bike when the last two nipples broke.

The first was a rather uneventful jaunt around the neighborhood using the Winwood Decksters, so then I decided to go for a bit longer ride. After donning a headlight I took off on the ~15 mile local loop, up to (and through) River Bends, back down 21 Mile, through a neighborhood, then over to my house. Along this entire route I made a point of keeping my weight over the rear wheel as much as possible, especially when going up sidewalk aprons, over large cracks in the pavement, roots, sticks, etc. Basically, I was trying to put a bit more than normal (for me) force on the wheels.

Half-way through the ride, in River Bends, a quick check showed that the wheel was just as true as when I’d left the house. Even better, I wasn’t hearing any of the occasional spoke-twang sounds from that wheel. They were still occasionally there from the front (especially when cornering hard), but the rear was spot-on.

I’ll definitely be rebuilding the front wheel in the same way quite soon. Hopefully that will be the last time I touch them.

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Tilling A Garden

Published May 2, 2009

Tilling the garden in Danielle's back yard which is being put where their pool had previously been.

Danielle is wanting to get her garden planted, so today she rented a tiller and I got to work on the gardens at her family’s house. Earlier in the day it had been covered by compost by her and her dad, and with the underlying sand all that it needed was a tilling.

I’d never actually used a rototiller, but it really wasn’t too bad. My arms and elbows are a bit sore from both keeping it moving and holding it back to prevent it from walking on the soil and not digging in. Beyond the 26′ circle shown above where the pool was, there was also another rectangular garden to be done, so I’m feeling a bit worn out.

Then, after the tilling there was anti-weed sheeting to lay, bricks to place, pavers to set, and her brother’s truck (which she’d borrowed to get the mulch) to wash. I’m pretty worn out. Hopefully I’ll still be able to get my bike wheel finished up before going for a test ride this evening.

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Nipples: Replaced

Published May 2, 2009

After four and a half hours (or so) of work, all of the alloy nipples in my geared bike’s rear wheel have been replaced. While the wheel is pretty true (maybe 0.5mm out at the largest spot) the dishing is still about 5mm off, so I’ll have to do more playing another day.

Also, that image above shows one of the feeler gauges recommended in the Wheelpro Book. It seems to work pretty well, although I do need to get better at using it. I imagine that will take quite some time.

(I also must fix the damned Park SW-40 spoke wrench. Its got a nice head on it, but the curved handle part bends too far over the head, so when the spoke comes off of the nipple at a slight angle the tool gets stuck in place.)

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Plastic Bottles from Sally Beauty Supply

Published May 1, 2009

Plastic bottles purchased from Sally Beauty Supply for applying boiled linseed oil to bicycle wheel parts.

At lunch today I purchased these two plastic bottles from Sally Beauty Supply to be used in applying boiled linseed oil to the spokes and nipples when rebuilding my bicycle wheels. I think I’ll give this a go after work today, as I’ve got a bit of time this evening and I could use a nice, focused, new project like this.

I’m just hoping that the hole on the tip of the larger bottle is small enough to allow for one drop at a time. It’s about 1mm, so I think it should be sufficient. If not, I guess I’ll just go to a dollar store, buy some cheap eye drops, empty the bottle, then use it. I think this will be all right, though.

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Sixteen Assembled SDrive NUXXs

Published April 28, 2009

Here’s one more SDrive NUXX photo for tonight: sixteen fully assembled devices with 2GB SD cards in the slots, awaiting final testing. Here’s a few more photos, which I’ll just link directly to:

· 16 front and rear end panels snapped into 32 bezels, ready for final assembly to begin.
· Rear panels fitted to the cases. Note that the plastic is left on the panels to protect them.
· PCB slid into an enclosure with the rear panel fitted, showing the front edge components.
· Front panel fitted on an SDrive NUXX showing the nice alignment of the tactile switches, LEDs, toggle switch, etc.
· Rear panel of an assembled SDrive NUXX showing how the DIP switches, reset button, and SIO connector align with the panel.
· SDrive NUXXs with panels and PCBs fitted, waiting for the installation of rubber feet and switch caps.
· Detail of the SDrive NUXX end panels, shown with the protective plastic film still in place.

I hope to have these, and all the other related orders (PCBs, uCs, kits, etc) ready to ship by the end of the weekend so that I can get them out on Monday.

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First Complete SDrive NUXX

Published April 28, 2009

Front of the first completely assembled SDrive NUXX, with MetalPhoto end panels.

There it is, the first completely assembled SDrive NUXX. Here’s the back, showing the SIO connector, reset button, and DIP switches.

I’m really, really happy with the MetalPhoto material used for the end panels. The manufacturer also did an outstanding job with the panels themselves. They snap nicely into the bezels, fit perfectly with the PCB, and just work.

After I finish eating this giant leftover portion of biyrani I think I’ll get to work assembling the rest of them.

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Wheelpro Truing Stand

Published April 26, 2009

Wheel truing stand based off the design in the Wheelpro Wheelbuilding Book.

Having had some wheel problems lately I’ve been wanting to build a truing stand. Well, tonight I did.

The stand above is based on the one in the Wheelpro Wheel Building Book, except made with 3/4″ plywood and unfinished. I still have to make some alignment tools and get another 1/4-20 machine screw for the base. Here is a photo another Wheelpro stand with some tools, built by a cabinet maker and with a melamine finish, originally from this page.

I think that I probably spent five or six hours building the stand, but as it only cost about $32 and I enjoyed making it, I think it’s worthwhile. An hour and a half or so was spent working the steel for the dropouts, but as I don’t have any real metal working tools it was a bit difficult. I also had a problem with a bit of tear out on the plywood, which is likely because I wasn’t paying attention to the direction of cut versus top layer grain, and had a multi-purpose blade on my saw. I’m also not great at woodworking, and hadn’t done anything with a table saw in at least two years.

It could have been a lot cheaper too, but being a Sunday when I went to purchase parts I ended up buying everything at Lowes. This meant $4.66 for four flat-head machine screws, $7.67 for the steel used for the dropouts, and $6.27 for the 2′ x 2′ piece of birch plywood. There was also the $4.35 countersink that I bought, then stupidly tried to use on steel, completely ruining it, relegating it to the trash can. Yes, I had to buy steel because I did not have any scrap pieces sitting around the house. At least now I do…

It also would have been possible for me to build a simpler stand, but this one seemed to do everything I wanted. The right dropout slides to accommodate different width hubs, it works fine with 26″ or 700c (29er) wheels, and it’s quite sturdy. This week I’ll have to order some replacement nipples for my wheels and find some time to make the alignment tools, then actually figure out how to tension a wheel after undoing it. That is, actually use the stand.

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SDrive NUXX PCB Assembly Complete

Published April 25, 2009

Sixteen of the assembled SDrive NUXX PCBs. They have all passed initial testing and are ready to be inserted into enclosures.

After working on and off for a week and a half, I have finished assembling most of the SDrive NUXX PCBs. It turns out that I’m missing a voltage regulator and DB25 connector, but I was still able to get 17 boards fully completed and two more missing only one component each. (The table pictured above contains more boards than shown, but I cut some off to better frame the image.)

Each board has also passed initial testing (100% success rate), which involves checking for shorts, checking voltages, checking LEDs, checking the buttons, and ensuring that the microcontroller can read the SD card. I’ll do more testing later, to be sure that booting an 800XL, running an app, doing R/W, and all that other important stuff works.

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